Sams Teach Yourself C# in 24 Hours
- Table of Contents
- Copyright
- About the Authors
- Acknowledgments
- Tell Us What You Think!
- Introduction
- Audience and Organization
- Conventions Used in This Book
- Onward and Upward!
- Part I. The Visual Studio Environment
- Hour 1. A C# Programming Tour
- Hour 2. Navigating C#
- Hour 3. Understanding Objects and Collections
- Hour 4. Understanding Events
- Part II. Building a User Interface
- Hour 5. Building FormsPart I
- Hour 6. Building FormsPart II
- Hour 7. Working with the Traditional Controls
- Hour 8. Advanced Controls
- Hour 9. Adding Menus and Toolbars to Forms
- Hour 10. Drawing and Printing
- Part III. Making Things HappenProgramming!
- Hour 11. Creating and Calling Methods
- Hour 12. Using Constants, Data Types, Variables, and Arrays
- Hour 13. Performing Arithmetic, String Manipulation, and Date/Time Adjustments
- Hour 14. Making Decisions in C# Code
- Hour 15. Looping for Efficiency
- Hour 16. Debugging Your Code
- Hour 17. Designing Objects Using Classes
- Hour 18. Interacting with Users
- Part IV. Working with Data
- Hour 19. Performing File Operations
- Hour 20. Controlling Other Applications Using Automation
- Hour 21. Working with a Database
- Part V. Deploying Solutions and Beyond
- Hour 22. Deploying a Solution
- Hour 23. Introduction to Web Development
- Hour 24. The 10,000-Foot View
- Appendix A. Answers to Quizzes/Exercises
Naming Conventions
To make code more self-documenting (always an important goal) and to reduce the chance of programming errors, you need an easy way to determine the exact data type of a variable or the exact type of a referenced control in C# code.
Using Prefixes to Denote Data Type
Table 12.3 lists the prefixes of the common data types.
Table 12.3. Prefixes for Common Data Types
| Data Type | Prefix | Value |
| Boolean | bln | blnLoggedIn |
| Byte | byt | bytAge |
| Char | chr | chrQuantity |
| Decimal | dec | decSalary |
| Double | dbl | dblCalculatedResult |
| Integer | int | intLoopCounter |
| Long | lng | lngCustomerID |
| Object | obj | objWord |
| Short | sho | shoTotalParts |
| String | str | strFirstName |
Denoting Scope Using Variable Prefixes
Prefixes are useful not only to denote data types, they also can be used to denote scope (see Table 12.4). In particularly large applications, a scope designator is almost a necessity. Again, C# doesn't care whether you use prefixes, but consistently using prefixes benefits you as well as others who have to review your code.
Table 12.4. Prefixes for Variable Scope
| Prefix | Description | Example |
| g | Global | g_strSavePath |
| m | Private to class | m_blnDataChanged |
| (no prefix) | Nonstatic variable, local to method |
Other Prefixes
Prefixes aren't just for variables. All standard objects (including forms and controls) can use a three-character prefix. There are simply too many controls and objects to list all the prefixes here, although you will find that I use control prefixes throughout this book.
Summary | Next Section
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